Hello sir, have you heard of our saviour Luchito?

It feels kinda surreal.

Hope he and his family are surrounded with love and strength during this difficult time.

I'm gonna be honest with everyone: despite the pain of not seeing Wata in the World Cup and retiring from international football (I cried the day he got injured and today, when he withdrew), it was also the best decision for him right now.

We all can say the 2025-26 season was AWFUL for Liverpool players, staff and fans:

Diogo's passing, along with his brother's, was devastating and something no one will ever recover from.

The team's general downfall in terms of performances and results despite the big summer transfer was unexpected.

The fragile relationships between Slot and some players (e.g. Mo and Curtis) had been hinted at for a while, but I guess nobody wanted to admit it.

The injury crisis the team experienced and the attempts to reduce its damage were insufficient.

Guys like Dom, Milos, Jeremie and Heki are missing the WC.

Losing Mo, Robbo and Ibou for free is painful; the increasingly likely departures of Curtis, Harvey, Macca and Fede don't make it any better.

Slot leaving was unexpected (if we remember what kind of people own the club), but unfortunately, it was the best thing for him and the team. I can see now that he tried his best in some aspects, and I regret not handling my disappointment better.

However, the more I reflect, the more I realise Wataru really experienced some of the worst outcomes of all this mayhem: of course, his injury was awful, and not playing in the World Cup must be extremely hard for him to the point he decides to retire from international football.

But, the situation was already so toxic for him: I read some LFC fans (in X mainly; people here on Tumblr are really nice to him) insulting him just because of his age, his abilities and the fact that he wasn't starting as many games with Slot as he did with Klopp (which, in my opinion, is one of the few things I will not forgive Slot for doing). In February, when he had his injury, they did 'care' just because he was used as a back-up right-back. Not to mention that he wasn't 'injury-prone' as some users call him, until he played fewer and fewer matches, even when he was needed or when Ryan or Curtis couldn't participate. It was up to the point that some comments in X were racist af since he's asian.

I can say the same thing about some Japanese NT fans: they criticised him for things he wasn't in control of and expected him to be perfectly fine and playing like Iniesta despite not being on a pitch for three months. He says in his latest X post that he has no regrets about all the effort he made over the last few weeks to the point he's, at least, running and kicking a ball at this moment, but it's still frustrating that he was called a 'liability.' He never complained about losing his starting place to other players and led and supported his team to impressive results.

He's not perfect. I'm aware of that. Nevertheless, he didn't deserve all the disrespect people gave him because, in my opinion, he's one of the few players who always tries his best and fights for the t-shirts he wears (even if those were Stuttgart, Japan, Liverpool, and any other uniform he wore). Also, even with the misery of the minutes he was given the last two years, he stepped on the pitch and made himself valuable. How many matches were saved because he played with all his might? A lot, to be honest.

He has one more year left, and he's already talking about retirement (not soon, but not far either). I wish he would see out his contract. He has made honours to his nicknames, 'the Japanese scouser' and 'The Samurai'. I really hope he can recover physically and emotionally and finish his career the best way possible.